Global games market intelligence firm Newzoo made its annual Global Games Market Report available to subscribers last week. The report, the industry standard for understanding and sizing the global games market, provides a detailed breakdown of the market in terms of revenue and gamer forecasts per segment. The report also explores the industry and market trends that are shaping and driving the gaming landscape and provides a detailed look at the newest developments per segment and region. The data is provided on a global and regional level along with detailed revenue projections and consumer insights for 28 countries.

According to the report, there are 2.2 billion active gamers in the world, of which 47%, or 1.0 billion gamers, spend money while playing. These gamers are expected to generate $108.9 billion in game revenues in 2017. Digital revenues will amount to 87% of the market at $94.4 billion. Ten years after the launch of the iPhone, mobile is the most lucrative segment for the second year running, with smartphone and tablet gaming growing 19% year over year to $46.1 billion, claiming 42% of the market. You can read more on these high-level numbers in this article and find all the latest high-level global and regional graphs in our resources section.

A light version of the report has been made available for free and you can download it here.

Selected Key Market & Industry Trends from the Report

Games are rapidly becoming the world’s favorite pastime: Consumers are spending more time than ever on games, and this is especially true for the millennial generation. The reason for this is that games now cater to a much wider variety of interests. This includes lean-forward (gaming intensely or casually), lean-back (viewing content created by peers or provided by the professional gaming scene), creating unique content and sharing (on-demand and live streaming). Viewing professional or amateur game video content is bringing back millions of lapsed gamers who no longer have the time to play but whose passion is reignited by viewing other players and worldwide championships. The term “gamers” is becoming increasingly obsolete, as it fails to capture the variety of ways that games entertain consumers. “Game enthusiasts” would be a more encapsulating term.

Newzoo CEO Peter Warman comments on the latest trends in the games industry: “The phase that the games market is now entering is redefining how we talk about our industry, audience, and future. From an industry perspective, the terms ‘game developer’ and ‘publisher’ no longer fit with the games-as-a-service model and the broadening of games as a business. From a consumer perspective, we need to broaden our terminology as well, as a large part of the fast-growing viewing audience does not play the games it watches. Games wouldn’t be games if we didn’t face another year of disruptive change and industry convergence.”

Game companies are becoming global entertainment companies: As game IP turns increasingly into entertainment franchises, game companies are rethinking their strategic position in the broader entertainment industry. Game companies are the champions of interactive entertainment and are outstanding at stimulating social, creative, and sharing behavior. They also rely almost entirely on direct consumer spending, as opposed to the advertising-based model of many digital or broadcast media companies. At the same time, the number of hours spent watching non-interactive (video) content around game franchises has exploded and is no longer seen as free marketing but as a serious new business opportunity. As traditional media struggle to offer an interactive component around their content, game companies are quickly learning how to monetize video content and its millions of viewers. This could ultimately lead to a media landscape in which game companies hold a key position, as they master both skills. The biggest game companies already entertain a far greater audience than most of world’s biggest traditional media and entertainment companies.

China still dominates the Top 100 Countries by Game Revenues

We have also updated our Top 100 Countries by Game Revenues Ranking, which still places China at #1 with $27.5 billion in revenues in 2017. The U.S. and Japan are second and third with revenues of $25.1 billion and $12.5 billion, respectively. Consumers in the U.K. will generate $4.2 billion game revenues this year, placing them at #5 ahead of South Korea. The most notable rise in the ranking is from India, which climbed from #20 to #17 with expected revenues of $818 million this year. The vast majority of India’s revenues, 78%, will come from (smart)phone gaming. This is not surprising, as the number of smartphones used this May amounted to 290 million, significantly more than the U.S., according to our Global Smartphone and Tablet Tracker. In terms of regions, Asia-Pacific continues to expand its lead with revenues of $51.2 billion in 2017, or 47% of the global market. Latin America will grow by 13.9% year on year to reach $4.4 billion this year, fueled by increasing smartphone and internet penetration. Key KPIs per region, including the top countries by game revenues, have also been included in the free report.

Newzoo’s Global Games Market Report: More than a report

Newzoo’s Global Games Market Report is an annual subscription service that includes quarterly trend and forecasting update reports as well as access to an online dashboard with continuously updated gamer and game revenue forecasts by country and segment. The service is subscribed to by the majority of the world’s leading games, media, hardware, and entertainment companies. Newzoo offers two similar services for Esports and Mobile.

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